lights
by mad to love
Summary: A hundred 100-word drabbles spotlighting the Gotei 13. Spoilers until current manga chapter. Multiple characters, pairings, genres. Rangiku, Gin, Kenpachi, Rukia, Oomaeda, Soi Fon, Kira, Byakuya, Nanao, Hisagi.
1. with a whimper

**notes:** written for the drabbles100 community on livejournal (prompts also taken from there), these 100 drabbles center around our favourite thirteen squads of soul society and its members. every drabble will _hopefully _be exactly 100 words, but we'll see. :)  
**additional:** title taken from_ the hollow men_, by t. s. eliot.  
**disclaimer:** k-troll owns bleach, i own nothing.

**prompt:** _054. air_  
**characters:** rangiku, gin  
**genre:** angst, general  
**word count:** 100

* * *

**with a whimper**

Her movements were quick as light, quick as time – she began and ended and began again as swiftly as moments do.

Stardust and blood (_his_) scattered around her, swept away with the wind's own unmerciful hand.

He provokes her, tempting, heat licking at her soles. They twist and turn the dance of _Death_.

But wind calms, dissipating, becoming nothing more than a gentle breeze. Eventually even fire simmers and leaves nothing but ashes of a late bloom.

With chrysanthemums wilted, heart broken, she returns to the battlefield once more.

She was the wind, and the wind didn't stop for anybody.

* * *

04/06/09


	2. the rest is silence

**notes: **title refers to the line spoken by hamlet in act v, scene ii of _hamlet_. opening line from _fire and ice_, by robert frost.

**prompt:** _011. red_  
**characters:** kenpachi  
**genre:** introspection, general  
**word count:** 100

* * *

**the rest is silence  
**

_Some say the world will end in fire. Some say in ice._

And really, it's all the same to him. No matter how you spin it, people live, people die. And in between is bloodshed.

In a war of the worlds, all he wanted to see was red. Full-blown carnage, he bathed in slaughtered (_sparkling_) crimson. He walked a butchered road, waiting.

For some sense of purpose.

He was immoral (_amoral_); to him, cheap thrills didn't exist. What more was there to do when you were already dead?

So he would hack and slash until there was nothing left, nothing left in this _un_life of his.

Until he was gone for good.

* * *

04/06/09


	3. because

**Prompt:** 071. _Broken_  
**Characters:** Rukia, mentions of Kaien  
**Genre:** Tragedy  
**Word Count:** 100

**Because**

-

Nobody had blamed her. Not her division or her Captain or _anyone_ in Seireitei. Except.

Except the ones she didn't dare face, _his_ family. And didn't that make her a hypocrite?

She wanted to scream, scream deep into the endless night, because no matter how many times she washed her hands, his blood would remain. She was covered, soaked, she _drowned_ in it.

Because she'd wanted to help, wanted to fight, wanted to save him, her sword had ended impaled through his torso. Because she always had to think twice when seeing Ichigo.

Because–

Kuchiki Rukia was a broken girl.

-

**fin.**


	4. opto

**Prompt:** 088. _He_  
**Characters:** Oomaeda, Soi Fon  
**Genre:** General  
**Word Count:** 100

**Opto**

-

"You're pretty cold today, _taichou_."

He stands in the doorway to her office, watching her finish, almost robotically, paperwork. He leans against the frame, brushing rice cracker crumbs from his face, grin wide.

"You keep your heart locked away."

He eyes the black cat accessories lining her shelves, wrinkling his nose. He sighs loudly, saying to no one in particular:

"My mother has this jewelry box she lets nobody touch. She loses the key so often she's stopped bothering to look for it."

She pauses for the smallest of seconds, graceful hand hovering over ink-filled page.

Smug, he walks away.

-

**fin.**


	5. odio

**Notes:** Well, to be Captain Obvious, the last chapter and this one are related, um, see, they even have the same quotations! :D But I was trying to find a name for it, which brought me to Robert Frost's poem, _Fire and Ice_. I see these two as contrasts, so that fit, but I didn't want to end there. So in the poem fire stands for desire and ice stands for hate (generally so), so _opto _and _odio _are latin for those, respectively (in verb form). Ramble, over.

**Prompt:** 089. _She_  
**Characters:** Soi Fon, Oomaeda  
**Genre:** General  
**Word Count:** 100

**Odio**

-

_You're pretty cold today._

All he knows is the shine of gold and the luxury of wealth running under his fingers. Only nonsense falls from his hungry mouth, and she has no time for fools. She's been taught better.

_You keep your heart locked away._

She ignores him, scribbling rapidly across the page, mouth set in a firm line. Obnoxious comment from an obnoxious idiot, a weak attempt at conversation.

_She loses the key so often she's stopped bothering to look for it._

She freezes, a momentary loss of control. Before she can reprimand herself for the distraction, he's gone.

-

**fin.**


	6. not waving but drowning

**Notes: **Title refers to the poem of the same name by Stevie Smith.

**Prompt:** 034. _Not Enough_  
**Characters:** Rangiku, implied Rangiku/Gin  
**Genre:** Introspection, Angst-ish General  
**Word Count:** 100

**Not Waving but Drowning**

-

_He didn't mean to_, she thinks.

She knows that's a lie to cover up for someone else's crime. She knows, but this lays her mind to rest.

_He's only ever been happy with me._

But then, that's not true either. He disappeared with _that man_ (the brains, the wizard, the ringleader), so what did that say about _them_? She exchanges her boisterous laugh for a drink that burns a trail of hot memories down her throat.

_Not enough. _

Not enough to send her senses reeling over the edge. Her stagger is still steady.

_Masochist._

She sits in her own poison.

-

**fin.**


	7. fallen eden

**Notes:** Yes, I love writing about the fox without actually...writing about him. :D

**Prompt:** 066. _Rain_  
**Characters:** Kira, _slight _mentions of Gin/Kira, Gin/Rangiku  
**Genre:** General, Angst  
**Word Count:** 100

**Fallen Eden**

-

The rain was back today.

Kira tightens his _Shihakushou _around himself, walking briskly down the stone path. It pelts down in a furious cascade, like crystals tumbling from the sky – _God's hand_.

His head hangs low on his shoulders, like a hunchback he hurries, hustles onward with no real destination. Something nags and prods at him, but his still-dazed mind doesn't pursue it.

Because Matsumoto had forbid him to, because she hurt like him.

But still the thought pesters, driven by his determination to think of anything _but_.

And he realizes:

It had never rained when his Captain was around.

-

**fin.**


	8. desperately seeking

**Prompt:** 080. _Healing_  
**Characters:** Rukia/Byakuya, one-sided Rukia/Ichigo  
**Genre:** Angst  
**Word Count:** 100

**Desperate Seeking**

-

It'd started out on a whim – bodies brushing just slightly – innocent, playful. A subtle act neither really cared for.

But then she was reminded that Kurosaki Ichigo, savior of Soul Society, was mortal. That she was as good as a specter to his world, reflected on the other side of the mirror.

And suddenly, grazes turn into shoves – violent, passionate. Rough elbows dig into slick limestone; she gasps and surrenders to the figure in name so close. Her _nii-sama_ is unrelenting, powerful, and she had hit his one weakness.

She knows she's not the only one being selfish this time.

-

**fin.**


	9. false pretense i

**Prompt:** 038. _Touch_  
**Characters:** Nanao, slight Shunsui/Nanao, Shunsui/Lisa  
**Genre:** Angst, Introspection  
**Word Count:** 100

**False Pretense I**

-

Nanao remembers her senpai well (not _very_, but _enough_): sharp, graceful, and there was an undoubted strength behind her every move that even _she_ could see back during her childhood.

She models herself after Yadoumaru-fukutaichou, and she likes to think she does a good job of it. Likes to think her Captain agrees. And maybe, just maybe, he does. And maybe (there are lots of those) that's why he'd chosen her as his new Lieutenant.

She's stricter, 'course, to keep him in line.

She also can't bear his touch, his endearments, or anything worth calling affection.

They're not for her.

-

**fin.**


	10. ash

**Prompt:** 082. _Death_  
**Characters:** Hisagi, vague mentions of Kanisawa & Aoga  
**Genre:** Introspection, Angst  
**Word Count:** 100

**Ash**

-

Death leaves behind a lingering scent, of something putrid, something ghastly and terrible. It weighs down the scene, squeezing the air out of your lungs, pushes you down on your knees.

Hisagi Shuuhei is glad his zanpakutou had materialized into Kazeshini rather than Wabisuke.

He was the ideal lieutenant: reliable, strong, loyal. He'd never betray Soul Society to "stand in the Heavens." He'd never let anyone down; would always, _always_ stick by his men.

Except he knows that isn't true. He broke the rules once, had _their_ blood splatter his clothing.

Their memory left a bitter taste in his mouth.

-

**fin.**


	11. eye for an eye

**prompt****:** _068. lightning_  
**characters:** byakuya, mentions of yoruichi, squinted ship  
**genre:** introspection  
**word count:** 100

* * *

**eye for an eye  
**

_She was a hurricane_, he thinks. _Lightning accompanying an unbending storm_.

Now, instead of a tempest, _a temptress_, she follows the after-effects of one. A mess, a fallen-in roof, a devastated city. She reeks of the past and stinks of old mistakes, old regrets.

He hates her.

He hates absolutely everything about her.

During her absence, he had become head of the Kuchiki family and Captain of the 6th Division. His shunpo was, for the most part, unrivalled. Even after all of this, her reappearance left a twisted feeling in his gut. One that would not leave.

He'd kill her.

* * *

12/04/10**  
**


	12. the pain you thought you'd forgotten

**note: **spoilers for deicide arc.**  
**

**prompt:** _079. agony_  
**characters:** rangiku, rangiku/gin  
**genre:** angst  
**word count:** 100

* * *

**the pain you thought you'd forgotten  
**

_No no NO Gin oh Gin…_

And following her scream, there is a silence punctuated only by the blood pounding in her ears and the breaking of her heart and the sobs that tore themselves from her throat.

She wills and she prays that he would just _look at her_, that he would convey some message that would make up for the decades of lost words and touches and feelings.

It isn't until she registers the shifting of a zanpakutou behind her that she realizes she's ready to go, always has been ready, to go with him wherever he'd gone.

* * *

10/07/11


	13. moving on

**note: **post-deicide arc, everyone feels shitty.**  
**

**prompt:** _047. heart_  
**characters:** hitsugaya, rangiku, maybe a ship  
**genre:** angst/drama  
**word count:** 100

* * *

**moving on**

The 10th Division's been quiet since Aizen's imprisonment (Hitsugaya doesn't consider it a victory; if anything, it feels like a loss). Its members had respectfully left their top two seats space and privacy: space for Matsumoto to mourn lost love and to nurse the wound in her heart, and privacy for Hitsugaya to calculate his losses and to count his shortcomings.

She stood by him, as always, dependable and stoic in the worst of times. Sweat dripped down his brow as he swung his sword again, releasing a cascade of ice.

He'd keep her heart together and she'd keep his.

* * *

18/07/11


	14. crumpled

**note:** 'break the cutie' mission success. :(**  
**

**prompt:** _085. missing_  
**characters:** hinamori  
**genre:** introspection  
**word count:** 100

* * *

**crumpled**

Hinamori wasn't always so frail.

She still isn't, but it's harder to see that now. Her former Captain had taken everything about her, crushed it thoroughly under his foot, and sent it all plummeting down from his place as an artificial God.

Tobiume remembers, though. She remembers, and is a reflection of, her former strength and fortitude as a Lieutenant, as a commander officer, as someone she'd initially looked up to. Hinamori had been the tender and soft-spoken example of a proper shinigami.

In another time, she'd been resilient, and brave, and idealistic, now she was only known as delusional.

* * *

18/07/11


End file.
